The Last of the Mortimers: A Story in Two Voices

She had been thinking of it too,—she, thoughtless as she was, found something in it not of a kind to die away and be passed over. I could not mistake, nor pretend to mistake, what she meant; it was to be read in her very eyes.

“My dear, I have told you already that your godmamma can have nothing whatever to do with this young man,” said I, with a little irritation; “if she is out of sorts it is nobody’s business. Do you fancy she could keep up an acquaintance with an Italian countess for more than twenty years, and I know nothing of it? Nonsense! Some fancy, or some old recollections, or something, had an effect upon her just at the moment. Speak to your father! Why, you told me he knew nothing about the Countess Sermoneta. Shall I ask him to feel your godmamma’s pulse and prescribe for her? or do you suppose, even if he were fit for that, your godmamma would allow it, without feeling herself ill? Your papa is highly respectable, and has always been much trusted by the family. But there are things with which one’s solicitor has nothing whatever to do; there are things which belong to one’s self, and to nobody else in the world.”

Poor little Sara! I did not mean to mortify the child! She grew crimson with pride and annoyance. I had no intention of reminding her that she was only the attorney’s daughter; but she reminded herself of it on the instant, with all the pride of a duchess. She did not say a syllable, the little proud creature; but turned away with such an air, her cheek burning, her eyes flashing, her little foot spurning the ground. She went off with a great sweep of her full skirts, disturbing the air to such an extent that I quite felt the breeze on my cheek. Perhaps it was just as well. Of course there was a difference between the Mortimers and the Cresswells. Because we did not stand on our dignity, people were so ready to forget what they owed to us. It was just as well the spoiled child could learn, for once in her life, that it was all of grace and favour that she was made so much of at the Park.

I made quite sure that she went to her own room directly, to see after the packing of her things, with some thoughts of starting for home at once, without even waiting for her father. However, when she began to talk to her little maid Alice, about that ball-dress, I daresay the other matter went out of the child’s head. The next that I saw of her was when she made a rush downstairs to ask me for postage stamps, with a letter in her hand, all closed ready to go off. She was still pouting and ill-tempered; but she contrived to show me the address of the letter. Alas, poor dear Bob Cresswell! it was to the Chester milliner, the best one we had, no doubt ordering a dress for the ball. Yet I do believe, for all that, the child could really have done what she said. I believe, if some great misfortune had happened, and her father had lost all his money, Sara’s first impulse would have been to clap her hands and cry, “Now everybody shall see!” Of course it is very dreadful to lose one’s fortune and become poor and have to work. But I wonder are there no other spoiled creatures in the world like Sara, who have their own ideas about such calamities, and think they would be the most famous fun in the world? Too much of anything makes a revulsion in the mind. Such over-indulged, capricious, spoiled children have often hardy bold spirits, and would be thankful for some real, not sham necessity. But, in the meantime, she had not the slightest idea of doing without her ball-dress.

Chapter XI.

“I want to know what you have done about Richard Mortimer,” said Sarah in her shrill whisper; “there has been no advertisement in the Times nor the Chester papers. I hope you are not losing time; what have you done?”

It struck me that Mr. Cresswell looked just a little abashed and put out by this question; but it might be the fire. He put up his hand to shelter his face, and hitched round his chair; then shrugged his shoulders a little, insinuating that she was making far too much of it. “My dear lady, advertisements are the last resort. I hope to do without any such troublesome process,” said Mr. Cresswell. “All the Mortimers in England will rouse up at the sight of an advertisement. I should prefer to take a little time. Information is always to be obtained privately when one has any clue at all.”

“Then have you obtained any private information?” said Sarah, in rather a sharp tone. She had no inclination to let him slide away till she was quite satisfied.

“Such things take their time,” said Mr. Cresswell, devoting all his attention to screening himself from the fire. “How you ladies can bear cooking yourselves up so, on this mild day, I cannot understand! I can hear you perfectly, Miss Mortimer, thank you; your voice is as distinct as it always was, though, unfortunately not the same tone. What a voice your sister used to have, to be sure!—went through people’s hearts like a bell.”

This was addressed to me, in the idea of being able to wriggle out of the conversation altogether. It is my conviction he had not taken a single step in the matter of Richard Mortimer; but if he thought he could shake off Sarah’s inquiries so, he deceived himself. She never was, all her life, to be turned from her own way.

“It is sometime now since we instructed you on this subject,” said Sarah. “If you have not made any discovery, at least you can tell us what you are doing. Milly, there, like a fool, does not care. She talks of Providence dropping us an heir at our door,—a foundling, I suppose, with its name on a paper pinned to its frock,” said Sarah, growing rather excited, and turning an angry look on me.

To my astonishment Mr. Cresswell also looked at me; his was a guilty, conscious, inquiring look. What strange creatures we all are! This shrewd lawyer, far from thinking that Sarah’s words referred to any mysterious trouble or derangement in her own mind, took them up, knowing his own thoughts, with all the quickness of guilt, to refer to Sara! He thought we had probably had a quarrel about leaving her our heiress; that I had stood up for her, and Sarah had opposed it. So he turned his eyes to me to see if I would make any private telegraphic communication to him of the state of affairs. And when he found nothing but surprise in my eyes, turned back a little disappointed, but quite cool and ready to stand to his arms, though he had failed of this mark.

“The truth is, there is nothing so easy as finding an heir. I’ll ensure you to hunt him up from the backwoods, or China, or anywhere in the world. There’s a fate connected with heirs,” said Mr. Cresswell, pleasantly, “whether one wants them or not they turn up with all their certificates in their pocket-books! Ah! they’re a long-lived, sharp-sighted race; they’re sure to hear somehow when they’re wanted. Don’t be afraid—we’ll find him, sure enough. If you had made up your minds to disown him, and shut him out, he’d turn up all the same.”

“Milly,” cried Sarah suddenly, with her little shriek of passion, all so unexpected and uncalled for that I fairly jumped from the table I was standing at, and had nearly overturned her screen on the top of her, “what do you mean by that fixed look at me? How dare you look so at me? Did I speak of disowning any one? Richard Mortimer, when he’s found, shall have the park that moment, if I lived a dozen years after it. Nobody shall venture, so long as I live, to cast suspicious looks at me!”

I declare, freely, I was unconscious of looking at her as though I had been a hundred miles away at the moment! I stood perfectly still, gaping with consternation and amazement. Such an unwarranted, unexpected accusation, fairly took away my breath. Mr. Cresswell, accustomed to observe people, was startled, and woke up from those dreams of his own which clouded his eyesight in this particular case. He looked at her keenly for a moment, then, turned with a rapid question in his eyes to me; he seemed to feel in a moment there was somehow some strange new element in the matter. But, of course, I had no answer to make to him, either with voice or eyes.

“I was not looking at you at all, Sarah,” faltered I. “I was not looking at anything in particular. Nobody is going to be disowned, that I know of. Nobody is seeking our property, that I know of,” I said again involuntarily, my eye turning with a kind of stupid consciousness, the very last feeling in the world which I wished or intended to show, upon Mr. Cresswell, who was quite watching my looks to see what this little episode meant.

He coloured up in a moment. He stumbled up from his chair, looking very much confused. He dared not pretend to know what I meant, nor show himself conscious, even that I had looked at him. He went across the room to the window, looked out, and came back again. It was odd to see such a man, accustomed and trained to conceal his sentiments, so betrayed into showing them. When he sat down again he turned his face to the fire, and almost his back to me. Matters had changed. It appeared I was not such a safe confidante as he had supposed.

“You shall very soon be satisfied about Mr. Richard Mortimer,” he said, looking into the fire. “Don’t be afraid; I am on the scent; you may trust it to me. But, really, I don’t wonder to see Miss Milly take it very reasonably. What do you want with heirs yet? If I had any thoughts of that kind, I should put all my powers in motion to get that little kitten of mine married. If I leave her by herself she will throw away my poor dear beautiful dividends in handfuls. But, somehow, the idea doesn’t oppress me; and, of course, I am older than any lady in existence can be supposed to be. I am——”

“Hold your tongue, Cresswell,” cried Sarah crossly. “I daresay we know what each other’s ages are. Attend to business, please. I want Richard Mortimer found, I tell you. You can tell him his cousin Sarah wants him. He will come, however far off he may be, when he hears that. You can put it in the papers, if you please.”

Saying this Sarah gave her muslin scarf a little twitch over her elbow, and held up her head with a strange little vain self-satisfied movement. Oh, how Mr. Cresswell did look at her! how he chuckled in his secret soul! From what I had seen once before I understood perfectly well what he meant. He had once taken the liberty to fall in love with Sarah Mortimer himself; and now to see the old faded beauty putting on one of her old airs, and reckoning on the fidelity of a man who, no doubt—it was to be hoped, or what was to become of our search for heirs?—had married and forgotten all about her years ago—tickled him beyond measure. He felt himself quite revenged when he saw her self-complacence. He ventured to chuckle at it secretly. I should have liked, above all things, to box his ears.

“Ah! to be sure; I’ll use all possible means immediately. It’s to be hoped he has ten children,” said Mr. Cresswell, with a very quiet private laugh. Sarah did not observe that he was laughing at her. I believe such an idea could never have entered her head. She began, with an habitual motion she had got whenever she left off knitting, to rub her fingers and stoop to the fire.

“And I insist you should come and report to us what you are doing,” said Sarah; “and never mind Milly; see me. It is I who am interested. Milly, as I tell you, thinks Providence will drop her an heir at the door.”

What could she mean by these spiteful sneering suggestions? I had thought no more of heirs for many a day—never since I got involved in this bewildering business, which I could see no way through. Her sudden attack sent a little thrill of terror through me. I was casting suspicious looks at her; an heir was to be dropped at our door; somebody was plotting against her fortune and honour. Good heavens! what could it mean but one thing? Mad people are always watched, pursued, persecuted, thwarted. I was cast from one guess to another, as if from wave to wave of a sea. I came back to that idea again; and trembled in spite of myself to think of little Sara and her father leaving us, and of being left alone to watch the insane haze spreading over her mind. It was sure to spread if it was there.

Chapter XII.

I WILL not undertake to say that we were a particularly sociable party at dinner that day. The stranger, Mr. Cresswell, who might have been supposed likely to give us a little news, and refresh us with the air of out of doors, was constrained and uncomfortable with the idea of having been found out. I am sure it was the last idea in the world which I wanted to impress upon him. But still, in spite of myself, I had betrayed it. Then Sara, without the faintest idea of her father’s uneasiness, had a strong remembrance of my unlucky words on the previous day, and was very high and stately, by way of proving to me that an attorney’s daughter could be quite as proud as a Mortimer—as if I ever doubted it!—and a great deal prouder. For really, when one knows exactly what one’s position is, and that nobody can change it, one does not stand upon one’s defence for every unwary word. However, so it was that we were all a little constrained, and I felt as one generally feels after a pretty long visit, even from a dear friend, that to be alone and have the house to one’s self will just at first be a luxury in its way.

Not having any free and comfortable subject to talk of, we naturally fell to books, though Mr. Cresswell, I believe, never opened one. He wanted to know if Sara had been reading novels all day long, and immediately Sara turned to me to ask whether she might have one home with her which she had begun to read. Then there burst on my mind an innocent way of putting a question to Mr. Cresswell which I had been very anxious to ask without seeing any way to do it.

“I don’t think you will care for it when you do read it Sara; it is all about a poor boy who gets persuaded not to marry, and breaks the poor creature’s heart who is engaged to him, because there has been madness in the family. High principle, you know. I am not quite so sure in my own mind that I don’t think him a humbug; but I suppose it’s all very grand and splendid to you young people. Young persons should be trained very closely in their own family history if that is to be the way of it. I hope there never was a Cresswell touched in his brain, or, Sara, it would be a bad prospect for you.”

“If you suppose I should think it a bad prospect to do as Gilbert did, you are very wrong, godmamma,” cried Sara. “Why shouldn’t he have been quite as happy one way as the other? Do you suppose people must be married to be happy? it is dreadful to hear such a thing from you!”

“Well, to be sure, so it would be,” said I, “if I had said it. I am not unhappy that I know of, nor happy either. Oh, you little velvet kitten, how do you know how people get through life? One goes jog-jog, and does not stop to find out how one feels. But I’d rather—though I daresay it’s very bad philosophy—have creatures like you do things innocently, without being too particular about the results. Besides, I think Cheshire air is good steady air for the mind,—not exciting, you know. I don’t think we’ve many mad people in our county, eh, Mr. Cresswell?—Did you ever hear of a crazy Mortimer?”

Mr. Cresswell looked up at me a little curiously—which, to be sure, not having any command over my face, or habit of concealing what I thought, made me look foolish. Sarah lifted her eyes, too, with a kind of smile which alarmed me—a smile of ridicule and superior knowledge. Perhaps I had exposed my fears to both of them by that question. I shrank away from it immediately, frightened at my own rashness. But Mr. Cresswell would not let me off.

“I have always heard that your grand-uncle Lewis was very peculiar,” said Mr. Cresswell,—“he that your cousin is descended from. Let us hope it doesn’t run in Mr. Richard’s family. I suppose there’s no reason to imagine that such a motive would prevent him from marrying?” he continued, rather spitefully. “And it was no wonder if Lewis Mortimer was a little queer. What could you expect? he was the second son! an unprecedented accident. The wonder is that something did not happen in consequence. Oh yes, he was soft a little, was your grand-uncle Lewis; but most likely it descended to him from his mother’s side of the house.”

“And my father was named after him!” cried I, with a certain dismay.

They all laughed, even Sarah. She kept her eyes on me as if searching through me to find out what I meant. She was puzzled a little, I could see. She saw it was not a mere idle question, and wanted to know the meaning. She was not conscious, thank heaven! and people are dismally conscious, as I have heard, when their brain is going. This was a little comfort to me under the unexpected answer I had got, for I certainly never heard of a crazy Mortimer all my life.

“If qualities descended by names, my little kitten would be in luck,” said Mr. Cresswell. “But here is a new lot of officers coming, Miss Milly; what would you recommend a poor man to do?”

“Papa!” cried Sara, with blazing indignation, “what does any one suppose the officers are to me? You say so to make my own godmamma despise me, though you know it isn’t true! I can bear anything that is true. That is why we always quarrel, papa and I. He does not mind what stories he tells, and thinks it good fun. I am not a flirt, nor never was—never, even when I was too young to know any better. No, godmamma, no more than you are!—nobody dares say it of me.”

We were just rising from table when she made this defence of herself. It was not quite true. I know she tormented that poor boy Wilde as if he had been a mouse, the cruel creature; and I am perfectly convinced that she was much disappointed Mr. Luigi did not come to the Park, because she had precisely the same intentions with regard to him. I must allow, though I was very fond of Sara, that, professing to be mighty scornful and sceptical as to hearts breaking, she loved to try when she had it in her power. I daresay she was not conscious of her wicked arts, she used them by instinct; but it came to much the same thing in the end.

I went out of the room with her, under pretence of seeing that her boxes were nicely packed; I did not say anything about it, whether I thought her a flirt or not, and she quieted down immediately, with a perception that I had something to say. I drew her into the great window of the hall, when Sarah, and immediately after her Mr. Cresswell,—for, of course, to him our early dinner only served as lunch, and no man would dream of sitting over his wine at three o’clock in the afternoon, especially in a lady’s house,—had passed into the drawing-room. It was a great round bay-window, at one end of the hall, where our footmen used to lounge in my father’s time, when we kept footmen. It had our escutcheon in it, in painted glass, and the lower panes were obscured, I cannot tell why, unless because it made them look ugly. The hall was covered with matting, and the fire had been lighted that day, but must have gone out, it felt so cold.

“Sara, I wish to say to you—not that I don’t trust your discretion, my dear child;” said I, “but you might not think I cared—don’t say anything about your godmamma, or about this Mr. Luiggi, dear——”

I was quite prepared to see her resent this caution, but I was not prepared for the burst of saucy laughter with which the foolish little girl replied to me.

“Oh dear, godmamma, don’t be so comical! it isn’t Luiggi, it’s Luidgi, that’s how it sounds,” cried Sara. “To think of any one murdering the beautiful Italian so! Don’t you really think it’s a beautiful name?”

“I freely confess I never could see any beauty in Italian, nor any other outlandish tongue,” said I. “Luidgi, be it, if that’s better. I can’t see how it makes one morsel of difference; but you will remember what I say?”

“Luigi simply means Lewis; and how should you be pleased to hear Lewis mispronounced? You said it was your father’s name, godmamma,” said the incorrigible child.

I turned away, shaking my head. It was no use saying anything more; most likely she would pay attention to what I said, though she was so aggravating; oh, but she was contrairy. Never man spoke a truer word. Nevertheless, as she stood there in her velvet jacket, with her close-cropped pretty curls, and her eyes sparkling with laughter, I could not help admiring her myself. I don’t mind saying I am very inconsistent. A little while before, I had been thinking it would be rather pleasant to have the house quiet and to ourselves. Now, I could not help thinking what a gap it would leave when she was gone. Then the child, who at home was led into every kind of amusement (to be sure procurable in Cheshire, must be added to this), had been so contented, after all, to live with two old women, whom nobody came to see, except now and then in a morning call; and though she was so wicked, and provoking, and careless, she was at the same time so good and clever (when she pleased) and captivating. One could have put her in the corner, and kissed her the next moment. As she stood there in the light of the great window, I, who had left her, shaking my head, and reflecting how contrairy she was, went back to kiss her, though I gave her a little shake as well. That is how one always feels to these creatures, half-and-half; ready to punish them and to pet them all at once.

However, after a while (though it was no easy matter getting Sara’s trunks on the carriage—I wonder Mr. Cresswell ventured on it, for his poor horse’s sake), they went away; and feeling just a little dull after they were gone, and as it was just that good-for-nothing time, which is the worst of an early dinner, the interval between dinner and tea, I set out for a walk down to the village. It was Sarah’s day for her drive, and she passed me on the road, and kissed her hand to me out of the carriage window. No blinds down now; the horses going at their steady pace, rather slowly than otherwise, wheeling along through the soft hedgerows which began to have some buds on them. I wonder what Jacob thought of it; I wonder what Williams at the lodge had to say on the subject. Such a strange unreasonable change!

Chapter XIII.

After I had given a glance into the shop where I saw Mr. Luigi’s fat servant,—I only saw him once, but yet the place seemed full of that fat, funny, good-humoured, outlandish figure, with his bows and smiles, and loquacious foreign speech, that poor Mrs. Taylor commiserated so deeply—I stepped across to the rectory to make a call there. The poor young shopkeeper, who had a night-class for the men and grown lads, and was really an intelligent, well-meaning young man, had been confiding his troubles to me. They did not care a bit about learning; they did not even want to read. When they did read it was the most foolish books! Poor young Taylor’s heart was breaking over their stupidity. And then, to keep a shop, even a bookshop, hurt his “feelings,” poor lad. He had been brought up for a teacher’s profession, he said—he even had some experience in “tuition.” He had thought he could make a home for his mother and his little sister; and now Dr. Appleby was grumbling that he did not succeed, and thought it his own fault! Poor young fellow! to be sure, he should have gone stolidly through with it, and had no business to have any “feelings.” But, you see, people will be foolish in every condition of life.

So I stepped across the road to call on Miss Kate, thinking of him all the way; thinking of him and that unknown young Italian, only once seen, whom the apparition of the fat servant in Taylor’s shop somehow connected with the young shopkeeper. How Mr. Luigi had forced himself into all my thoughts! and yet the only one fact I knew about him was, that he was looking for an apocryphal lady whom nobody ever heard of! Should I have thought no more about him but for Sarah’s mysterious agitation? I really cannot tell. Again and again his voice came back to me, independent of Sarah. Whose voice was it? Where had he got that hereditary tone?

Miss Kate was in, for a great wonder. She was wonderfully active in the parish. She was far more the rector, except in the pulpit, than good Dr. Roberts was. I am sure he was very fortunate to have such an active sister. I don’t think anything ever happened, within a space of three or four miles round the village, that Miss Kate was not at the bottom of it. Of course I expected to hear everything over again that Dr. Roberts had told us about Mr. Luigi. But, so long as Sarah was not present, I could take that quite easily. Indeed, I wished so much to know more of this stranger, somehow, that I really felt I should be glad to hear all that they had to say.

“I was indeed very much interested in the young man,” said Miss Kate, starting the subject almost immediately, as I expected. “I think great efforts should be made to lay hold of every one that comes out of his poor benighted country. I said so to the Doctor; but the Doctor’s views, you know, are very charitable. Mr. Hubert, however, quite agreed with me. I asked him to come back when he came to this part of the country again, and said I should be very glad to have some serious conversation with him. He stared, but he was very polite; only, poor young man, his thoughts are all upon this lady. I have no doubt he thought it was that business I wanted to talk to him about.”

“But I suppose, like Dr. Roberts, you can throw no light upon her; who she is, or where she is?” said I. “It is strange he should seem so positive she was here, and yet nobody remembers her. For my own part, if I had once heard it, I am sure I should never have forgotten that name. I have a wonderful memory for names.”

“Very strange no doubt,” said Miss Kate, with a little cough. “And then, that man of his. Alas, what an imprisoned soul! To think he should be in the very midst of light and faithful preaching, and yet not be able to derive any benefit from it! I never regretted more deeply not having kept up my own Italian studies. And poor Mr. Hubert—but you would hear all about that; the Doctor does so delight in an amusing story. They could not understand each other in the very least, you know. Ah, what a matter it would be to get hold of that poor Domenico—that’s his name. Why, he might be quite an apostle among his countrymen, when he got back. But nothing can be done till he can be taught English, or some agency can be found out in Italian. I can’t tell you how much interest I feel in these poor darkened creatures. And to think they should be in the midst of the light, and no possibility of bringing them under its influence! I don’t speak of the master, of course, who knows English very well; but I am not one that am a respecter of persons,—the servant is quite as much, if not more, interesting to me.”

“If they stay long I daresay he’ll learn English,” I suggested modestly; “but it will be a sad pity if the poor gentleman has come so far to seek out this lady, and can’t find any trace of her. I promised him to do all I could to find out for him; but nobody seems ever to have heard of her. It will be a thousand pities if he has all his trouble for no end.”

“Ah, Miss Milly! let us hope he may acquire something else that will far more than repay him,” said Miss Kate; “disappointments are often great blessings in directing one’s mind away from worldly things. We were all very much interested in him, I assure you. Mr. Hubert promised to write to a friend of his in Chester to ask if he could give him any assistance. If it were only for the sake of that strange resemblance,—the Doctor would tell you, of course, the resemblance which struck both him and myself?”

“No,” cried I; “did you find out anybody he was like? I only saw him in the dark, and could not make out his face; but his voice has haunted me ever since. I was sure I knew the voice.”

“I wonder the Doctor did not mention it,” said Miss Kate, with a little importance. “The truth is, it struck us both a good deal; a resemblance to your family, Miss Milly.”

I don’t know whether I was most disposed to sink down upon my chair or start up from it with a cry; I did neither, however.

“To my family?” I gasped out. “Yes; it was very singular,” said Miss Kate; “I daresay, of course, it was only one of those accidental likenesses. I remember being once thought very like your sister. How strange you should think you knew his voice! You have some relations in Italy, perhaps?”

“Not that I know of,” said I, feeling very faint. I cannot tell what I was afraid of; but I felt myself trembling and shaken; and I durst not get up and go out either, or Miss Kate would have had it all over the parish before night, that something had gone wrong at the Park.

But I don’t remember another word she said. I kept my seat, and answered her till I thought I might reasonably be supposed to have stayed long enough. Then I left the rectory, my mind in the strangest agitation. That this stranger, who had driven Sarah half mad, should be like our family; what a bewildering, extraordinary thing to think of! But stranger still, at this moment, when I had just heard such a wonderful aggravation of my perplexity—that voice of his which had haunted me so long, and which I felt sure I could identify at once, if the person it once belonged to was named to me, vanished entirely from my mind as if by some conjuring trick. It was extraordinary—it looked almost supernatural. I could no more recall that tone, which I had recalled with perfect freshness and ease when I entered the rectory garden, than I could clear up the extraordinary puzzle thus gathering closer and closer round all my thoughts.

In this state of mind I hurried home, feeling really as if there must be something supernatural in the whole business, and too much startled to ask any definite questions of myself. When I had reached the house, and was going upstairs, I met one of the maids coming down, who had been upon some errand into Sarah’s room. This careless girl had left—a thing never even seen when my sister happened to be out for her drives—the room-door open. Before I knew what I was doing, I had stepped inside. I can’t tell what I wanted—whether to speak with Sarah or to spy upon her, or to listen at her door. Carson and she were in the dressing-room, I could hear. And now I will tell you what I did. I don’t think I was responsible for my actions at that moment; but whether or not, this is what I did. I stepped forward stealthily, stooped down to the keyhole, and listened at the door!

There! I have said it out. Nobody else knows it to this day. I, who called myself an honourable person, listened at my sister’s door. For the first five minutes I was so agitated by my strange position that, of course, I did not hear a word they said. But after a little I began to hear indistinctly that they were talking of some letter that had better be burned—that Carson was speaking in a kind of pleading tone, and Sarah very harsh and hard, her words easier to be distinguished in that hissing whisper of hers than if she had spoken in the clearest voice imaginable. I can’t say I was much the better for the conversation, till at last, just as I was going away, came this, which made my heart beat so loud that I thought it must be heard inside that closed mysterious door:

“And to think they should have called him Lewis, too; though the English is a deal the prettiest. Ah, ma’am,” cried Carson, with a little stifled sob, “it showed love in the heart!”

“Yes, for the Park,” said Sarah, in her whisper. I dared not stay a moment longer, for I heard them both advancing to the door. I fled to my own room, and dropped down there on my sofa stupified. My head ached as if it would burst. My heart thumped and beat as if it would leap out of my bosom Lewis! my father’s name—and, good heaven!—the voice! What did it—what could it mean?

PART IV.

THE LIEUTENANT’S WIFE.
(Continued.)

Chapter I.

WHAT a strange little quaint place Chester is! I thought I should never have been tired walking along those ramparts, looking over the soft green slopes, and up to the blue hills in the distance, and down here and there upon the grey old churches and the quiet busy little town; but at first we had our lodgings to look for, which was a much more serious matter. I had made up my mind from the very first not to expect to be called upon, nor to go into society; or rather I had set my face against any chance of it, knowing always that we could not do it on the little money we had. But now I found out that Harry was not content with this. He was very anxious to have better lodgings, where ladies could come to see me. I should say dearer lodgings, for better than Mrs. Saltoun’s we could not have had. He wanted me to have quite a drawing-room instead of our nice, cosy, old-fashioned parlour, which was good for everything; and then to think people might be asking us to dinner, and how many embarrassments and troubles we might meet with! For it is embarrassing to be asked out, and to be obliged to let the people suppose you are sulky, and ill-tempered, and won’t go; or else to invent excuses which, besides being sinful, are always sure to be found out; when the real reason is simply that one has not a dress, and cannot afford to get one just then. The other ladies in the regiment might wonder what sort of person I could be, and tell each other that poor young Langham had married some poor girl, and been very foolish. It was exactly true—so he had; and as I can’t say I had any idea that he could be ashamed of me, I took it all very quietly. So long as we were happy, and could afford to live in our own way, I did not mind; but now Harry had got discontented, somehow or other. He was quite in a fuss to think that I was not received as I ought to be, and a great many more things like that—perhaps somebody had said something to him, as if he were supposed to be ashamed of me—at all events he had changed his mind from our first plan; and though I felt quite convinced my way was the wisest, I had to change it as before. Anything was better than having him uncomfortable and discontented. I supported myself with Mrs. Saltoun’s opinion, and went with resignation to look at all those expensive lodgings.

The people seemed all to guess that we belonged to the new regiment; and some of them were quite great ladies, and quite enlightened me as to what we should require. For most of the day I was in a perfect panic; every place seeming dearer than another. When we went into those expensive rooms I always found out something that it was quite impossible for me to tolerate (quite independent, of course, you know, of any question of price!) till Harry quite fretted at my fastidiousness. At last we did find a place that suited me. It was no great thing in point of situation. It was a first floor, a front and back drawing-room. I believe, candidly, that the back room was about as big as Mrs. Saltoun’s good substantial old dining-table, which we used to have in our sitting-room in Edinburgh; but then there were folding-doors; and the front drawing-room was decorated and ornamented to such a pitch that one was quite afraid to sit down in any of the chairs. When I heard what the rent was, I was charmed with the rooms. Harry could not understand my enthusiasm. I found it the handiest place in the world;—and then it showed such discrimination in the landlady to ask so moderate a rent. We fetched Lizzie and baby from the inn directly, and dismissed Harry to look at the town. And really, when we got a little settled, it was not so uncomfortable; though, to be sure, to give up the sizeable room for company (and they never came!), and to live in that little box behind was very foolish, as I always thought. However, when, I above and Lizzy below, we had investigated the house, and when the landlady was made to comprehend, with difficulty, that our washing was done at home, and that her toleration of these processes was needful, and when her wonder and the first shock to her system conveyed in this piece of intelligence was over, things looked tolerably promising. The worst was, we had no view; no view whatever except the bit of garden plot before the house, filled with dusty evergreens, and the corner of a street which led to the railway station. The cabs and people, going to and from the trains, made the only variety in the prospect; and anybody will allow that was sadly different from windows which looked sidelong over the corner of Bruntsfield Links, upon the Castle, and the Crags, and Arthur’s Seat. However, what I had to think of, in the meantime, was how to live without getting into debt; for, of course, people like us, with just so much money coming in (and oh, how very, very little it was!), had neither any excuse nor any way of saving themselves if once they ventured into debt.

Thus we got established in our new quarters; and many a long ramble I took with Harry along those strange superannuated walls.—To think how they once stood up desperate, in defence, round the brave little town! to think of the wild Welsh raging outside on that tranquil turf, where the races were now-a-days; to think of those secure streets down there, that lengthened themselves out presumptuously beyond the ramparts, and even cut passages through them, once cowering in alarm below their shadow! The place quite captivated me; and then the streets themselves, the strange dark covered pathways, steps up from the street, with the shops lurking in their shadow! like some of the German towns, Harry told me. Looking into them from the street, and seeing the stream of passengers coming and going, through the openings and heavy wooden beams of the railing; or looking out of one of those openings upon a kind of street-scenes and life that had nothing in the world to do with the strange old-world arcade, from which one looked out as from a balcony, was as good as reading a book about ancient times. It was not like my dear Edinburgh, to be sure, but it was very captivating; and Harry and I enjoyed exploring together. It was all new and fresh to us—and it was spring; and when you have nothing to trouble you much, it is delightful to see new places, and get new pictures into the mind. Chester was quite as novel, and fresh, and captivating, though it was only in our own country, as that German Munich which Harry told me of—Harry had been a great traveller before he joined, while his father was so long ill—could have been.

Lizzie, however, was not nearly so much at her ease as I was. When she felt herself laughed at, and looked at, and misunderstood, Lizzie fell back into her chronic state of awkwardness. Her national pride was driven to enthusiasm by her contact with “thae English.” Lizzie entertained a steady disbelief that the tongue in which she heard everybody speak—which was far enough from being a refined one, however,—was their native and natural speech. “They were a’ speaking grand for a purpose o’ their ain, to make folk believe they were lords and leddies,” Lizzie said; and with a still higher pitch of indignation, “Mem, you aye understood me, though you’re an English leddy; and think o’ the like o’ them setting up no’ to understand what your lass means when she’s speaking! I dinna understand them, I’m sure,—no half a dozen words. To hear that clippit English, and the sharp tongues they have, deaves me. The very weans in the street they’ve nae innocence in them. They’re a’ making a fashion of speaking as fine as you.”

“Never mind, Lizzie; you’ll soon get accustomed to them, and make friends,” said I, with an attempt at consolation.

“Friends! I never had anybody belonging to me but a faither,” said Lizzie, who understood relations to be signified by that word: “but I’m no heeding now; and I’ll soon learn to nip the ends off the words like the rest o’ them. There’s a grand green for drying, that Mrs. Goldsworthy calls the back ga’den; and, if you’ll no’ be angry, I can do the ironing grand mysel’.”

“You! but I dare not trust you, Lizzie,” said I, shaking my head. “Mr. Langham would find it out—I mean he would find me out—if they were not quite so well done; and you don’t consider what quantities of things you will have to do—to keep the drawing-room nice, and get tea and breakfast, and wash, and I don’t know what; and yet always to be tidy, and keep baby all day long. You don’t know what you have on your hands already, you unlucky girl.”

“Eh, I’m glad!” cried Lizzie, clapping her hands together with fervour; and her brown eyes sparkled, and her uncouth figure grew steady with the delight of conscious energy and power. If she had been eighteen she would not have been so simple-minded. Never anybody was so fortunate as I had been in my little maid.

Chapter II.

VERY soon we began to get interested in the people round about us; for we were not here, as we had been in Mrs. Saltoun’s little house, the only strangers. By means of Lizzie, who was much annoyed at the discovery, I found out that the house was quite full of lodgers. On the ground floor there was a foreign gentleman and his servant. The gentleman was absent at first; but the man, a very fat, good-humoured-looking fellow, who adopted us all into his friendship immediately, and expanded into smiles through the railings of the stair when any of us went up or down, was in full possession. The way that Lizzie avoided this smiling ogre, and the way in which he appreciated her panic, and was amused by it, and conciliated and coaxed her, was the most amusing thing I ever saw. And the way he opened the door for me, and took off his hat, and laid his hand on his heart and bowed! The good fellow quite kept us in amusement. When baby, who was getting on famously and noticing everything, crowed at him, in spite of his great beard, as children will do to men (it is very odd; but babies do take to strange men sooner than to strange women, I believe), the fat foreigner burst into great shouts of delighted laughter, and snapped his fat fingers, and made the funniest grimaces to please the child. None of us could speak a single word of his language; we did not even know at first what countryman he was; but we all got to have the most friendly, kind feeling for the stranger,—all except Lizzie, who stumbled up and flew downstairs in her anxiety to avoid his eyes. One bad habit he certainly had; he smoked perpetually. He smoked cigars—shocking bad ones, Harry said: he did not even put them down when he sprang out of his parlour to open the door for me; but only withdrew the one he was smoking from his full red lips, and held it somehow concealed in his hand. As he was constantly about in the house, or lingering close at hand with his great-coat buttoned on round his throat like a cloak, and the empty sleeves waving from his shoulders, stamping his feet on the ground, and whistling like a bird, this smell of bad cigars was perpetually about the house. Poor Mrs. Goldsworthy went up and down with the most grieved look upon her face. If any one made the least sign of having smelt anything disagreeable, she held up her hands in the most imploring way, and said, “What can a poor body do? He’s the obligingest creatur as ever was! and he don’t know a word of Christian language; and the gentleman—which is a real gentleman, and none o’ your make-believes—as good as left him in my charge; and, bless you, if he will smoke them cigars, and don’t understand a word a body says to him, what am I to do?” Indeed, for my own part, I had not only a great sympathy for him, but I could not help liking the fat fellow; and after a few days it was astonishing how we got used to the cigars.

Then we ourselves occupied the two next floors. It was a strange little house; two rooms, back and front, piled on the top of each other four stories high; the top-story rooms were attics; and there was actually a lodger in each of those attics! Where Mrs. Goldsworthy and her daughter slept themselves was more than either Lizzie or I could make out. One of the attic lodgers was a thin, wistful man, whom I could not help looking at. He worked at something in his own room, and used to go out to dine. He was always very neat and clean; but very threadbare, and with a hungry look that went to one’s heart. Perhaps it was not want; maybe he was hungry for something else than mere money or nourishment; but sometimes I am sure I should not have been surprised to hear that he was starving too. Sometimes he looked at me or at baby in his wistful way, just as he vanished past us. I can’t say he ever smiled, even at little Harry; but still we drew his eyes when he chanced to meet us going out or in. I felt a great compassion for this poor solitary man. He was a man that might have been found starved, but never would have asked any charity; at least so I thought of him. I used to fancy him sitting in his solitary room upstairs by the window, and not by the fire,—for we never heard him poking any fire, and often saw him at the window,—and wondered how people could get so isolated, and chilled, and solitary; how they lived at all when they came to that condition—benumbed of all comfort, and still not frozen to death. How strange to think of keeping on living, years and years after one’s heart is dead! Harry said I was fanciful and continually made stories about people; but I did not tell Harry one half of my fancies; I don’t know what he would have done to me if I had; but I did so wish I could have some chance of doing something to please that old man.

One day Harry came downstairs with a smile on his face. “There is the most ludicrous scene going on below; come and look, Milly,” he said, drawing me to the stairs. I peeped down, and there, to be sure, I saw a reason for the sound of talking I had heard for a few minutes past. Lizzie was sitting on the stair, pondering deeply, with a perplexed face, over a large book spread out on the step above her. She was holding baby fast in one arm, and staving off his attempts to snatch at the leaves of the book. Leaning on the bannisters regarding her, and holding forth most volubly in an unknown tongue, was our fat friend; and between every two or three words he pointed to the book, making a sort of appeal to it. The contrast between the two—she silent and bewildered, confused by her efforts to restrain baby and comprehend the book—he, the vast full figure of him, so voluble, so good-humoured, so complacent, talking with his fat arms and fingers, his gestures, and every movement he made—talking with such confidence that language which nobody understood—was almost as irresistible to me as to Harry. We stood looking down at them, extremely amused and wondering. Then Lizzie, failing to comprehend the book, and hearing herself addressed so energetically, raised her round eyes, round with amazement, to the speaker’s face. The unknown tongue awed Lizzie; she contemplated him with speechless wonder and dismay; until at last, when the speaker made an evident close appeal to her, with a natural oratory which she could not mistake, unintelligible as was its meaning, her amazement burst forth in words. “Eh, man, what div ye mean?” cried Lizzie, in the extremity of her puzzled wonder. It was the climax of the scene. Though I thrust Harry back into the room instantly, that his laughter might not be heard, and smothered my own as best I could, the sound caught Lizzie’s watchful ears. In another moment she had reached the top of the stairs, breathless, with her charge in her arms. The puzzled look had not left Lizzie’s eyes, but she was deeply abashed and ashamed of herself. Harry’s laughter did not mend the matter, of course. She dropped baby in my arms, and twisted herself into all her old awkward contortions. I had to send her away and dismiss Harry into the other room. Poor Lizzie had never possessed sufficient courage to permit herself to be accosted by the dreadful foreigner before.

However, we were not less amused when we heard what Mrs. Goldsworthy would have called “the rights of it.” Lizzie, with great resolution, determined to have herself exculpated, came to me with her statement as soon as she was quite assured that “the Captain” was out of the way.

“Eh! I came to think at last he was, maybe, a Hielander,” said Lizzie, “though they’re seldom that fat. And he laid down the book straight before in the stair. I kent what kind of book it was. It was the book wi’ a’ kind o’ words, and the meanings. But the meanings just were English, and the words were some other language. And I kind of guessed what he wanted, too. He wanted me to look in the book for the words he said, to tell me what he meant; but eh! how was I to ken where one word ended and another began? And he just hurried on and on; and the mair I listened, the mair I could not hear a single word, and looking at the book was just nonsense; and Master baby, he would try his hand; and oh, Mem, if you’re angry, I didna mean ony ill, and I’ll never do it again.”

“Nonsense, Lizzie! I am not angry; but couldn’t you get on with the dictionary, and help the poor fellow? Were not you a very good scholar at school?”

“No very,” said Lizzie, hanging her head in agonies of pleased but painful bashfulness, and unconsciously uttering her sentiments in language as puzzling to an English hearer as any uttered by our fat friend downstairs. “No very,” said Lizzie, anxiously truthful, yet not unwilling to do herself due credit;—“no very, but gey.”

Here I fear my laugh rather shocked and affronted Lizzie. She stood very upright, and twisted nothing but her fingers. It would have been as impossible to persuade her that there was scarcely a person in Chester, but myself, who could have translated that exquisite monosyllable as to convince the foreigner that he was actually and positively incomprehensible in spite of the dictionary. But I will not attempt to interpret gey; it is untranslatable, as we are quite content so many French words should be. Even into Harry’s head, which should be capable of better things, I find it quite impossible to convey an idea of the expressiveness of this word. Lizzie and I, however, knew no other to put in its place.

“But a gey good scholar might do a great deal for the poor fellow,” said I, when I had got over my laughter; “tell him the English names for things. Try if you can find out his name; but I forgot you were frightened for him, Lizzie.”

“Aye, till I thought he might, maybe, be a Hielander,” said Lizzie. “Though the Hielanders dinna belang to us at hame, they might feel kindly in a strange place; and I’ve heard folk speaking Gaelic. But this is no like Gaelic, it’s a’ aws and os; and it’s awfu’ fast, just a rattle; a’ the words run in to one another. Forbye what harm could he do me? and the book was straight in my way on the stair; and it gangs to my heart to set my foot on a book. Ye might be trampin’ ower a bit o’ the Bible without kennin’; and then he’s very good-natured; and then,” said Lizzie, her eyes suddenly glowing up, “it would be grand to learn a language that nae ither body kens!”

With the greatest cordiality I applauded this crowning argument, and did all I could to encourage her to persevere with the dictionary, and make herself interpreter; for I was not wise enough to think that this new study might possibly be too captivating for Lizzie, and lead her into neglect of her many and pressing duties. I only thought it was the most amusing mode of intercourse I ever heard of, and that it would be great fun to watch its progress. Besides, as she said herself, what harm could he do her? Poor Lizzie, who might have been in danger at an elder age in such a comical friendship, was invulnerable to all the dangers of flirtation at fourteen.

Chapter III.

“Would he laugh like that if I had jaggit him?” cried Lizzie. There was no contesting that proof; so I had to withdraw the ribbon out of their joint hands immediately, and put it at once to its proper use. This, however, was neither the first nor the last of Lizzie’s impromptus. Those great red fingers of hers, all knuckles and corners as they were, had that light rapid touch which distinguishes every true artiste. She devised and appropriated for the decoration of the baby and “the credit of the house,” with the utmost boldness. It was not safe to leave anything which she could adapt to his use in her way.

The next trial I had was an invitation to dinner, which came for us shortly after. I set my face very much against it. Long ago, when Harry used to tell me about their parties, I made up my mind it never would do for us to begin going to them, however much we might be asked. To be sure Harry might go. I was always glad Harry should go; but how was I, who had got no trousseau, like other young wives, when I was married, but just had one cheap silk dress, bought off Aunt Connor’s ten pounds, which I made up myself, to go out to dinner? I stood out long and obstinately; but I had to give in at last, just as I had about the maid and the lodgings. Harry would not go by himself. He would not decline the invitation; he said, with a very glum face, that we had better accept, and leave it to the chapter of accidents to find an excuse at the time. He did not understand how necessary it was for me to keep at home. He had been able always to go where he wanted, and keep up with the rest, and it fretted him dreadfully now to feel the bondage that our narrow means put us in. You understand he did not object to be economical in a general way, nor even, indeed, grumbled, the dear good fellow, at giving up many of his old luxuries; and, at first, he seemed to be delighted with having no society but our own. But now, when he began to feel annoyed that his wife was not in the same position as the others, and when I plied him with all the old arguments—that we dare not begin such a life or the expense would ruin us, Harry became very restive indeed. Somehow it seemed to gall and humble him; the idea that his wife could not go out for want of a dress! He could not put up with the thought; he jumped up from his chair as if something had stung him. “It is nonsense, Milly! folly; the merest shortsightedness; you don’t want half a dozen dresses to go to one dinner, and one dress can’t ruin us,” cried the unreasonable fellow. He would not understand me or listen to me. The notion wounded him quite to the heart. He looked so sulky and miserable that I could not bear to see it. I gave a great sigh, and gave in again. What could I do?

“Well, Harry!” said I, “the foolishness is all on the other side, mind; but if I must give in I can’t help myself. I am only twenty, not twenty quite. I’ll go in white.”

“Bravo! you could not do better than go in white!” cried Harry, “there’s a courageous woman! But why, may an ignoramus ask, should you not go in white, Milly darling! Isn’t it the dress of all others for a—well, an ugly little creature like you?”

“I am not so sure about the ugly,” said I; “and now, please, get your hat and come out with me. I saw the fashions in a window at the other end of the street. Let us go and look at them, and then I shall know how to make it up.”

“Why can’t you go to the milliner like other people,” growled the unsatisfied man; “and why, answer my question, shouldn’t you go in white?”

I durstn’t confess that I had my own vanity in the matter, and being a matron, rather despised a white muslin frock to go out in; for if I had betrayed the least inkling of such a thing, there is no saying what he might not have done; run up a bill, or paid away all the money he had, or something; so I stopped his mouth with some foolish answer, and ran off to get my bonnet. Upstairs baby was sitting on the carpet, with Lizzie beside him, jumping a little paste-board harlequin to please him. Her brown eyes were quite sparkling over the loose-legged, insane figure, as she jerked the string about. I could not help but stand and look at her for a moment with a startled sensation. She was just as much amused as baby was. Only to think of such a child being left in charge of our boy! I went downstairs in consequence with a slower step, after having given Lizzie a superabundance of cautions about taking care of him. Only a girl of fourteen! I daresay all this time you must have been thinking I was mad to trust her; but, indeed, she was a very extraordinary girl; and after all, when you think it, fourteen is quite a trustworthy age. She was old enough to know what she ought to do, and not old enough to be distracted by thoughts of her own. Ah, depend upon it, fourteen is more single-minded than eighteen; and then Lizzie had a woman’s strength and handiness along with her child’s heart.

Not to delay longer about it, we did go to the party. Harry said I looked very well on the whole; he did not think he would have been disposed to exchange with anybody. I had no jewellery at all, which was rather a little humiliating to me; but, to my wonder and delight, Harry did not object to that. “They’ll only think you’re setting up for simplicity,” he said, laughing. “I suppose it’s safer to be thought a little humbug than to have your dreadful destitution known. Come along. Nobody will suspect you have not a bracelet; only mind you behave yourself very innocently, like a little shepherdess, and you’ll take everybody in.”

I cannot say I very much admired this piece of advice; and if Harry had thought me the least likely to take it, I am sure he would not have been so ready with his good counsels. The party disappointed me a great deal. How is it one reads in books of society being so captivating, and intoxicating, and all that, and how, when one is used to it, one can’t do without it? On the contrary, it was as dull—duller than anybody could imagine! Instead of that delightful stream of conversation always kept up, and so easy, and so witty, and so clever, you could see perfectly well that everybody was trying to contrive what they should say, and to find out things that would bear talking about. The poor lady of the house was so anxious to keep up the talk that she ate no dinner in the first place; and in the second, evidently frightened by the pauses that occurred, kept talking loud herself, and dancing on from one subject to another till she was quite breathless. Then there was one man who was expected to make you laugh—people prepared to laugh whenever he opened his lips; but I am sorry to say I was so indiscreet as only to stare at him, and wonder what it was about. I caught the eye of the young lady sitting by him as I did so. She was little,—less than me,—dark, and very, very pretty. She was only Miss somebody, but she was dressed more richly than anybody there, and had the most beautiful bracelets. I could not help feeling a little when I looked at my poor wrists and my white muslin dress—I who was married, and she only a young girl; when, just at that moment, she gave me a quick look, lifting up her eyebrows, and smiling rather disdainfully at the great wit beside her. Immediately we two were put in communication somehow. I suppose it was mesmerism. Her eyes kept seeking mine all the time of dinner. The odd thing about her was that her hair was quite short, hanging in little curls upon her neck, like a child’s; and of all things in the world, for such a child to wear, she was dressed in violet velvet, the most beautiful shade in the world. I suppose Harry would have said she was a little humbug too, and did it for effect; but, to be sure, it must have been wealth and not poverty that did it in her case. When we went up to the drawing-room after dinner, she very soon made her way to me. The other ladies, most of them belonging to the regiment, had come round me, and were doing their best to discover why I had been kept in the dark so long, and whether anything could be found out about me. I stood at bay pretty well, I think; but when Miss Cresswell came in, somehow all at once, like a fresh little breeze, in her soft velvet dress, to the sofa beside me, I really felt I could have laid down my head on her shoulder and cried. To be sure it was very foolish; one can smile and keep up when one is being baited, and when one finds a real friend after being aggravated out of one’s life, it is only natural to feel disposed to cry. I say a real friend, though I never saw her before,—it was mesmerism, I suppose; we took to each other at once.

We had got quite intimate before the gentlemen came upstairs. I had told her where we lived, and she promised to come and see me, and we had found out a great many opinions we had in common. Things were different, however, when the gentlemen appeared. All the young men hovered about Miss Cresswell. There were few young ladies, and she was certainly much the prettiest; and, I am very grieved to have to say it—I cannot deny that she did flirt a little. She was disdainful, and would take no notice of anybody at first, but by degrees she did come to little bursts of flirtation; and I am afraid she liked it too. Then there began to be things said about her and me which displeased me. We were “Art and Nature,” somebody said; and some of the gentlemen evidently entertained the same feeling that Harry indicated, when he said they would suppose me a little humbug. Evidently we were both thought little humbugs, sitting by each other to set each other off. Some of them, I do believe, thought it had all been made up beforehand. Certainly we were a strange contrast; I, in my plain white dress, with no ornaments; she in velvet, with such a quantity of jewellery. But to have people looking at me, and contrasting me with Miss Cresswell, and making jokes upon my dress and hers, was what I did not choose to put up with. People accustomed to society may like it, but I did not. So I got up and took Harry’s arm, and went to look at a picture. Nobody spoke to us for some five minutes or so, but we were close to some ladies talking with all their might. Then some one touched my arm, and I saw Miss Cresswell had followed me, and brought an old gentleman with her. This was her father. I got behind one of the talking ladies to veil my “simplicity,” that there might be no more nonsense about it. The ladies were talking of women working. Oh, so little they knew or pretended to know about it; I wonder what they would have thought if they could have seen my laundry operations; or, indeed, I wonder, under all their fine talk, whether they had not, of mornings, some work to do themselves. However, I only tell this from the glimpse it gave me of my new friend.

“It is all very well to speak of hardships,” cried Miss Cresswell. “I can’t see any hardship in doing one’s work. Ah! don’t you think they are very happy who have something to do?—something they must do whether they like it or not. I hate always doing things if I like! it is the most odious, tiresome stuff! If I like! and if I like it pray, what is the good of it? It is not work any longer, it is only pleasure.”

“My dear child,” said one of the old ladies, “be thankful you have so much ease and leisure. Your business just now is to please your papa.”

Here the old gentleman burst in with a long slow laugh, “To worry him, you mean,” said Mr. Cresswell; “tell her of her duty, Mrs. Scrivin. Ah, my dear lady, she’s contrairy!” he cried, shaking his head with a certain air of complacence and ruefulness. Miss Cresswell gave him such a flashing, wicked look out of her dark eyes, and then seized my hand to lead me away somewhere. She was not a dutiful good girl, it appeared; she did not look like it. Now she was roused up, first by flirting, and then by rebellion and opposition, you could see it in her eyes. I am sorry, I am ashamed to confess it—but I do believe I liked her the better for being so wicked. It is very dreadful to say such a thing, but I am afraid it was true.